Paper Info
Title
Variable neighbourhood search heuristics for the probabilistic multi-source Weber problem.
Abstract
The Multi-source Weber Problem (MWP) is concerned with locating in facilities in the Euclidean plane, and allocating these facilities to n customers at minimum total cost. The deterministic version of the problem, which assumes that customer locations and demands are known with certainty, is a non-convex optimization problem and difficult to solve. In this work, we focus on a probabilistic extension and consider the situation where customer locations are randomly distributed according to a bivariate distribution. We first present a mathematical programming formulation for the probabilistic MWP called the PMWP. For its solution, we propose two heuristics based on variable neighbourhood search (VNS). Computational results obtained on a number of test instances show that the VNS heuristics improve the performance of a probabilistic alternate location-allocation heuristic referred to as PALA. In its original form, the applicability of the new heuristics depends on the existence of a closed-form expression for the expected distances between facilities and customers. Unfortunately, such an expression exists only for a few distance function and probability distribution combinations. We therefore use two approximation methods for the expected distances, which make the VNS heuristics applicable for any distance function and bivariate distribution of customer locations. Journal of the Operational Research Society (2011) 62, 1813-1826. doi:10.1057/jors.2010.159 Published online 17 November 2010
Year
DOI
Venue
2011
10.1057/jors.2010.159
JORS
Keywords
Field
DocType
information systems,inventory,scheduling,production,bivariate distribution,logistics,forecasting,reliability,mathematical programming,information technology,operations research,communications technology,marketing,distance function,computer science,management science,location,investment,probability distribution,project management,operational research
Heuristic,Mathematical optimization,Joint probability distribution,Computer science,Metric (mathematics),Heuristics,Probability distribution,Probabilistic logic,Optimization problem,Operations management,Weber problem
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
62
10
0160-5682
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
0
0.34
11
Authors
3
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
I. Kuban Altinel115014.60
Necati Aras246230.62
Kerem Can Özkisacik380.90